Her eyes widen, then glaze over and then, in what I can only describe as a calm and measured frenzy, she proceeds to test the load-bearing capacity of a standard issue shopping trolley.

In the absence of a ground plan with scale, it's impossible to accept this contention, specially because the substantive questions of proper alignment of pillar bases and their load-bearing capacity remain unresolved.

In addition, studies at the University of Alaska suggest that a warming of the permafrost by only 3 [degrees] C decreases its load-bearing capacity by up to 70 per cent.